In October 2013 NICE produced guidance (DG11) recommending the use of faecal calprotectin testing to help doctors distinguish between inflammatory bowel diseases, such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, and non-inflammatory bowel diseases, such as irritable bowel syndrome. You can read more about the NICE guidelines here. The Health Technologies Adoption Programme (HTAP) are now…
The second Alpha Laboratories seminar on Diagnostics for Digestive Health was held on the 17th October at the Academy of Medical Sciences in London. The day brought together gastroenterologists, consultant biochemists and biomedical scientists to hear presentations from leaders in this field.
New guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) was released on the 2nd October regarding the use of Faecal Calprotectin as a diagnostics test for inflammatory diseases of the bowel. It advises doctors to use simple stool tests as an option to distinguish between potentially serious inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and…
We are now taking bookings for this year’s Diagnostics for Digestive Health Seminar. The event takes place on 17 October 2013 at the Academy of Medical Sciences, Portland Place, London. The draft agenda is below, and the event is worth 7 IBMS CPD points and 6 RcPath CPD points.
Two new reports out this month detail new guidelines for the diagnosis and management of IBS and IBD in Primary Care. Traditionally, making a diagnosis of IBS or IBD has been difficult and frustrating both for patients and clinicians due to the similarities in clinical symptoms. Correct diagnosis is important however as management and treatment…
22 April 2013: NTAC (NHS Technology Adoption Centre) have published a report reviewing Faecal Calprotectin which is a simple diagnostic test which can aid clinicians to more accurately identify those patients who have IBS and those who have a high probability of IBD, who will require urgent referral for specialist assessment. NTAC worked with sites…
In this case study, Arne Roseth reflects on a case last year where he met a patient who’d been wrongly diagnosed with IBS over 16 years ago. Last July I was reading through the list of referrals for a colonoscopy. One caught my immediate interest: A 32 year old woman, many years with IBS type…
Dr Sean Nugent, Consultant Gastroenterologist,of The Whitfield Clinic, Waterford, Ireland, talks to us about his introduction of the Quantum Blue Calprotectin Test into his clinic. Alpha Labs: Can you describe your clinical service at the Whitfield Clinic? Dr. Nugent: I run a full time private practice in Gastroenterology, upper and lower GI tract and liver…
Those laboratories initially using a lower throughput system for calprotectin measurement,such as the BÜHLMANN Quantum Blue kit, may find they need to transfer to a more cost and time-effective automated, higher-throughput system. When deciding which higher-throughput assay to use, it is important to consider:
Traditionally, the treatment aim in patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) has been clinical remission evaluated by clinical indices, especially among patients with symptoms of predominantly inflammatory origin1. However, the correlation between such indices and the degree of inflammation has been questioned and Saverymuttu et al2 showed low correlation between the Crohn Disease Activity Index…